This invention relates to a mechanical transmission system for automatically breaking off and a method thereof, and more particularly to a mechanical transmission system, which is automatically breaking off in response to an earthquake.
Currently, a semiconductor manufacturing apparatus employs a robot to put a plurality of wafers in a boat. A boat robot transmits a boat onto a thermal insulation tube of a tubular base and then again transmits a boat to the tubular for processing the semiconductor manufacturing steps.
Presently, all of construction of the semiconductor manufacturing apparatus is considered for avoiding or reducing the oscillation of the machine caused by an earthquake so as to reduce the manufacturing cost.
When there comes an earthquake, the displacement of the hardware structure inside the machine will appear. After the earthquake, the corresponding positions of the boat and the thermal insulation tube will be changed. But the boat robot of the tubular machine will remain unchanged to execute the action which is set in the original program. Thus if the earthquake occurs on the moment that the boat robot is travelling, the continuous actions of the robot will overturn and break the boat and the wafers thereon.
For dealing with the technical defects described above, the applicant keeps on carving unflaggingly to develop xe2x80x9cmechanical transmission system for automatically breaking off in response to earthquake and method of the samexe2x80x9d through wholehearted experience and research.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a mechanical transmission system for breaking off automatically in response to an earthquake and a method thereof.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a mechanical transmission system which can break off automatically to avoid the mechanical transmission device to be damaged due to the displacement of the hardware structure inside the system caused by an earthquake when the Richter scale of the earthquake reaches the preset value.
According to an aspect of the present invention, the mechanical transmission system for transmitting an article to a machine and being able to break off automatically in response to an earthquake via receiving a control signal generated by an earthquake detecting device includes a mechanical transmission device for transmitting the article to the machine, a warning device for generating a warning signal in response to the control signal, and a control circuit electrically coupling to the mechanical transmission device and breaking off in response to the control signal for avoiding the damage of the mechanical transmission device or the machine caused by the earthquake.
Preferably, the mechanical transmission device is a robot.
Preferably, the control circuit is a motor driver circuit of the mechanical transmission device.
Preferably, the warning device is a liquid crystal display (LCD).
Preferably, the warning device is a seven-segment display.
Preferably, the warning device is a buzzer.
Preferably, the warning device is a light emitting diode (LED).
Preferably, the mechanical transmission system includes an uninterruptible power supply (UPS).
Preferably, the mechanical transmission system further includes a signal check device for confirming whether the control signal is correct or not.
Preferably, the signal check device is constituted by a delayed circuit.
Preferably, the mechanical transmission system includes a restarting device for restarting the mechanical transmission device after the structure displacement of the machine is adjusted.
Preferably, the article is a wafer.
Preferably, the machine is a semiconductor apparatus.
Preferably, the earthquake detecting device is a seismograph.
In accordance with an aspect of the present invention, an automatically control system for transmitting an article to a machine includes an earthquake detecting device for detecting an earthquake and generating a control signal in response to the earthquake, and a mechanical transmission system electrically connected to the earthquake detecting device and breaking off in response to the control signal for avoiding the machine whose structure displacement is caused by an earthquake being damaged by the mechanical transmission system.
Preferably, the earthquake detecting device is a seismograph.
Preferably, the article is a wafer.
Preferably, the machine is a semiconductor apparatus.
In accordance with another aspect of the present invention, a method for automatically breaking off a mechanical transmission device in response to an earthquake is provided. The mechanical transmission device is electrically connected to an earthquake detecting device and includes a warning device and a control circuit for transmitting an article to a machine. The method includes steps of generating a control signal by the earthquake detecting device when an earthquake is detected, receiving the control signal by the warning device and generating a warning signal in response to the control signal, and breaking off the mechanical transmission device via the control circuit in response to the control signal for avoiding the machine whose structure displacement is caused by an earthquake to be damaged by the mechanical transmission device.
The above objects and advantages of the present invention will become more readily apparent to those ordinarily skilled in the art after reviewing the following detailed descriptions and accompanying drawings, in which: